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It shouldn’t really surprise anyone that the COVID situation in America has been long-term messy. We had a denier President who saw political opportunity in a re-election year, for one. Dos: we rely on communication from places like the CDC and the FDA, who tend to be scientists and academics that don’t necessarily understand how people like to receive messages. Third: social media and platforms rush in to fill the crevices of confusing, overlapping information. And finally, America has “extreme individualism” per most measures, and that’s become both a blessing and a curse.
The blessing part is obvious: people (a subsection of people, at least) want freedom and opportunity, and fear that government overreach will destroy us and plunge us into some nightmare from the 1700s. You can’t argue with people’s belief structure. Well, you can try, but good luck. People hold belief and identity closer than almost anything, including their loved ones. Remember: we only claim it’s a “data-driven” world. It’s a belief-driven one.
Now, the cons (curse) of individualism gets tricky. I don’t want to remove personal agency from anyone, but there’s a collective responsibility at some point. There’s a low chance that you’re going to grow horns and die in five years from getting a vaccine; Pfizer approval probably means increasing mandates, which probably means your…
